Progression
by Eden Lies
Summary: We all move forward, even though we constantly look back. But who's to say that moving backwards is such a bad thing? Progress goes both ways. Mild SebastianxCiel, slightly fluffy. Oneshot.


Hey guys, while I was being bored on a trip, I suppose my crazy brain decided I needed to write something mildly fluffy, so here it is! :P the very first section is basically the end of Songbird, but I don't really think of this as a part of that series. This fic was also partly inspired by Maiden_of_the_Moon's fic called Rotten, you y'all should go read it ^-^.

Disclaimer: I don't own Kuroshitsuji, etc.

Rating/Warnings: T, this doesn't have anything too bad in it. Mild SebastianxCiel, way more fluffy than what I'm used too, some OOC-ness.

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**Progression**

_**(Light in August)**_

_**

* * *

**_The light in August is fading but lovely; it illuminates the fields in ways he would have never thought possible. Musky sunlight glints off of his tailcoat's brass buttons, and never has the demon felt more at peace. His attention is suddenly drawn to the sound of ice clinking against glass. His master is lounging on the grass, on a picnic blanket, sipping his iced tea. The boy is silent for a few moments as he stares into the distance, taking in the brilliant golden fields that stretch as far as the eye can see.

"There aren't many days like this," he says finally, and the butler has to agree.

* * *

Sebastian packs away the picnic blanket as the sun dips lower and lower in the sky. They begin walking, but not back towards the mansion. The mansion is from another lifetime, is from the past. Ciel Phantomhive makes it a point to always move forward, and never, ever go back. Though sometimes, he really does long for his childhood, his parents, and a sort of innocence he has long since lost.

"Sometimes I wish I could be the child I was years and years ago," he says to Sebastian.

"Only sometimes?" asks the butler.

"Only sometimes." confirms the earl.

They walk in silence through the endless fields, and finally make their way into the sprawling orchards. The sun dips lower than the horizon.

* * *

Under the vine-trapped arch of the orchard's labyrinth, engulfed in the growing darkness of the evening, Ciel Phantomhive remembers.

* * *

Eve.

Eden.

An apple.

The serpents that forced her to eat.

* * *

_There once was a boy named Eve. He lived in a pretty, perfect world. His father was stern but kind, and infinitely gentle. His mother, petite and aristocratic, loved him without boundaries and taught him everything he knew. He laughed and played, and did absolutely anything he put his mind to. _

_ He was in Eden. _

_ But his Eden, like any other Eden, fell to a serpent._

_ The serpent crept in on Eve's tenth birthday, in the form of scorching hellfire. His mansion was ruined, his parents burned. His parents, his parents! And he didn't burn with them. He was kidnapped, beat, raped, and mentally broken. Some days, sitting cut and bruised in his dark prison cell, Eve wished he could have died with his parents in the fire. It was better to be dead than to be alive in the state he was in. _

_ Ten years old was too young to fully recognize an idea like hatred or vengeance. But as he was raped, as a brand burned into his back, something huge, vicious, and all-consuming grew within Eve. This devouring presence was threatening, splitting apart the threads of morality and sanity he had left. The growing force pushed and pushed, pushed Eve into something he knew not. This presence, this second serpent, pushed him into calling anything to rescue him, and slay his wicked captors._

_ One day (or was it a night?) as he lay stripped, desolate on an altar, the final thread within Eve snapped. Taking a daring bite into the dripping ruby apple, Eve prayed to the devil to save him. _

_ Shadows shook and shaped themselves, and Eve was immediately drawn to the ruby-red eyes of the manifesting creature, his intoxicating apple._

_

* * *

_The wind blows against his face as he wanders under the apple trees, bringing with it the choking scent of overripe apples. Ciel closes his eyes for a moment, breathes in deeply, and walks on, to the center of the cluster of apple trees.

He sits against the base of the broadest tree and examines the fallen, rotten apples surrounding him on the floor. His apple, his Sebastian, has always been a rotten one. He has only just recently realized it.

The boy's spidery white fingers reach for one of the rotten apples, but suddenly, gloved fingers envelop his own and forcefully pull him into a standing position.

"Young master," says Sebastian, "You need not touch these rotten apples."

"Then why are you touching me?" says the boy, and he pulls his hands out of his butler's grip.

The two stand separated, far beneath the seat of true knowledge (the branches and heavens above), surrounded by, at the level of, unbearably rotten things.

* * *

In the deep darkness and thick silence that surrounds the Earl, he cannot see his butler moving. But unnatural wind whips his hair wildly about, and he can feel some sort of supernatural force at work. Suddenly, as if it were not the middle of the night, Ciel can see his surroundings perfectly clearly. He immediately looks at his butler.

In Sebastian's gloved hand sits a rotten apple. "Young Master," says the butler, "Things change. People change. Even I change. And that's because we all move forward, even though we constantly look back. You often think of your imprisonment and torture, and I often think of the exact moment in which you summoned me. What a ripe apple I seemed to be, right young master?"

The demon grins, but Ciel can see the bitterness infused into his butler's expression.

"But the truth isn't that I've always been a rotten apple, or that I am a ripe, new apple and have always been one since the day you met me. In rotting, in becoming overripe, I have progressed forward. But who's to say that the favorable state of an apple is ripe? Why is it that a rotten apple is always thought of as bad? Why are criminals evil, when heroes perform deeds just as wicked? Why are demons always the evil, why are angels always the good? Why is that, young master? Why?"

The demon is breathing heavily, and for the first time as far as the Earl can remember, Sebastian seems almost angry. Ciel finds he has no words with which he can respond.

The orchard is completely silent for many sluggish moments.

Sebastian, anger boiling over, takes a few cautious steps closer to his master, and the **sincere**, slightly forlorn expression on his face nearly makes Ciel choke.

"But young master," Sebastian says quietly, "I can make anything change if you want me to. Just say the word, and you will see only what you wish to see."

With his unoccupied hand, he takes one of Ciel's hands, and this time, the boy doesn't object. The demon places the boy's hand over the rotten apple in his own. Ciel feels a shudder pass through him.

"Look," commands the demon gently, and just as Ciel expects, the apple is healthy and perfectly ripe again. The butler hands him the apple, and the boy stares at it for a few moments.

And he knows what he has to do.

He lets the ripe apple fall to the ground, grabs desperately at Sebastian's upper arms, and wills the demon to understand, wills him to get it.

"There is nothing wrong with rotten things," says Ciel, and he allows himself to be wrapped into his butler's embrace.

In the warmth of the demon's hold, the boy feels enlightened.

And though it is the middle of the night, Ciel Phantomhive feels as if its morning again.

* * *

"_Do you know why I only sometimes wish for my childhood?"_

"_No, not at all."_

"_It's because sometimes I can't stand the thought of living in a world without you."_

_

* * *

_The sun is rising, and two distinct figures appear at the horizon, walking back along the path they had traveled through days prior.

Going backwards, Ciel realizes, isn't such a bad thing. Leaving behind the orchards, leaving behind the golden fields, it isn't such a bad thing. Because he understands now. Progress goes both ways.

The pair makes their way to the edge of the fields, through Finian's tamed gardens, and soon enough, they are at the mansion's back gate. The Earl reaches for the iron-wrought gate and allows himself to take a hold of it. The butler urges the boy forward gently, but he remains still in his place. The sun has fully risen now, and it illuminates the mansion in ways both the boy and the butler would have never thought possible. For the first time in months, Ciel Phantomhive is actually glad to be home.

"There aren't many days like this," he says finally, and the butler has to agree.

* * *

Ooh, the fluff, the fluff. It burns my eyes! :P Please rate and review people, it would really make my day.


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